The Dover Quartet combines beauty and richness of sound

This teenage musical marriage has been a personal and professional success.

Tony Sauro

This teenage musical marriage has been a personal and professional success.

"What attracted both pairs are our similarities," Camden Shaw said. "We recognized in each other the same values, really, about beauty and the richness of sound. We're all pretty similar."

An observant college professor recognized the same qualities and suggested Shaw and his then-19-year-old friends wed their talents in a string quartet.

"We were just doing it for fun," said Shaw, who plays cello in The Dover Quartet. "He said, 'You guys should think about getting married.' So we got married."

Five years later, they won the 2013 Banff International String Quartet Competition on Sept. 1 in Alberta, Canada.

When Shaw, violinists Joel Link and Bryan Lee and violist Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt play Sunday at University of the Pacific's Faye Spanos Concert Hall, their two-hour performance includes "String Quartet," written for them by Eric Sessler, who teaches at Philadelphia's Curtis Institute. That's where the group was united in 2008 and its members now are artists-in-residence.

They'll also play Samuel Barber's String Quartet and Franz Schubert's Quartet in A Minor ("Rosamunde").

Engaging Sessler, 44, and other contemporary composers helps keep chamber music evolving. Shaw, Link and Pajaro-van de Stadt, are 24. Lee is 25.

"I hate to over-use the metaphor," Shaw said. "But it's so similar to food. It's very tangible. Fast food, salt, fat and the basics excite you for awhile.

"But we all recognize when we can sit down and enjoy a really great meal. It's at the same level as making music. It's a really deep experience. You wouldn't be able to have a great meal on a bus."

After winning the top award at Banff - one of the world's two major string-quartet competitions - Shaw and his partners won't be riding many buses.

In addition to a matching set of "gorgeous bows" crafted by Montreal's Francois Malo, they received $25,000 and the "big thing," Shaw said. "The real prize, essentially, is ... three years of pre-packaged tours."

The Dover Quartet's victorious performances - honed during a year of playing the selections in concert - also had an ancillary effect.

"One thing that's great is our competition days are probably coming to a close," Shaw said. "It's a stamp of approval and a wonderful honor. Now, we can focus on actual music. That week was a culmination of years of work. A manifestation of a lot that happened before."

That began when the quartet - Shaw grew up in Bellevue, Wash.; Link is from Atlanta, Ga.; Lee was right at home in Philadelphia; and Pajaro-van de Stadt arrived from Jacksonville, Fla. - met and experienced natural compatibility at the Curtis Institute.

Shaw and Pajaro-van de Stadt were playing as a duet. Link and Lee were part of a string quartet.

"It was quite a good fit," Shaw said. "We decided they had so much experience it was instantly easier music-making."

They all "grew up idolizing" Leonard Rose, a cellist in the Guarneri Quartet. Shmuel Ashkenasi - who plays violin in the Vermeer Quartet and has "very exacting ideas, phrasing, structure, a very clear intellect" - is the Curtis tutor who suggested the Dover "marriage."

Shaw and the quartet aren't stuck in the past artistically.

"Folk music has played a certain role," Shaw said. "We really, really admire folk fiddlers. They're really incredible, natural and unfettered by the stresses of perfection. It's such an inspiring thing to hear. It's all about the experience and conveying of stories."

That's why they keep commissioning new compositions.

"We want to become a bigger and bigger part in the process," Shaw said. "Actually, we're commissioning two at the moment. It's very important. There's such a great history. A lot of composers are a little bit nervous. There's such a tremendous, daunting load of music, they're afraid their piece will just have no chance.

"We do tremendous outreach in various forms - a lot for schools as part of our tours. We get a tremendous response. When we play (Dmitri) Shostakovich and (Bela) Bartok, kids go absolutely nuts. It's a conduit for exploring other composers."

It helps sustain the ensemble's successful "marriage."

"It's more than a full-time family," Shaw said. "It's a full-time family and a quartet at the same time."